Hackman Quotes

Hollywood loves to typecast, and I guess they saw me as a violent guy. ~ Gene Hackman

I'm not a sentimental guy. ~ Gene Hackman

Reality does not change to match one's belief. ~ J.M. Hackman

I'm disappointed that success hasn't been a Himalayan feeling. ~ Gene Hackman

That's something that would really sell. I mean, I admire that you tell stories of make-believe people in worlds that don't exist and that have no relevance to how we live. That can be nice, but people also like things that are uplifting and practical.
(From the short story: The Late Novels of Gene Hackman) ~ Rivka Galchen

If I start to become a star, I'll lose contact with the normal guys I play best. ~ Gene Hackman

I don't trust air I can't see. ~ Gene Hackman

Like a duck on the pond. On the surface everything looks calm, but beneath the water those little feet are churning a mile a minute. ~ Gene Hackman

And Hackman had really choked up when he was telling it. It was very moving. ~ Wes Anderson

launch the team well, and only then to help members take the greatest possible advantage of their favorable performance circumstances. Indeed, my best estimate is that 60 percent of the variation in team effectiveness depends on the degree to which the six enabling conditions are in place, 30 percent on the quality of a team's launch, and just 10 percent on the leader's hands-on, real-time coaching (see the "60-30-10 rule" in Chapter 10). ~ J. Richard Hackman

The difference between a hero and a coward is one step sideways. ~ Gene Hackman

Honesty isn't enough for me. That becomes very boring. If you can convince people what you're doing is real and it's also bigger than life - that's exciting. ~ Gene Hackman

Hackman's paradox: Groups have natural advantages: they have more resources than individuals; greater diversity of resources; more flexibility in deploying the resources; many opportunities for collective learning; and, the potential for synergy. Yet studies show that their actual performance often is subpar relative to "nominal" groups (i.e. individuals given the same task but their results are pooled.) The two most common reasons: groups are assigned work that is better done by individuals or are structured in ways that cap their full potential. ~ J. Richard Hackman

Things parents say to children are oftentimes not heard, but in some cases you pick up on things that your parent would like to see you have done. ~ Gene Hackman

Hey, I'm just trying to become the Michael Caine/Gene Hackman of my generation. ~ John C. Reilly

I do not like assassins, or men of low character. ~ Gene Hackman

Nothing counts so much as family, the rest are just strangers. (as Nicholas Earpp in Wyatt Earp, 1994) ~ Gene Hackman

A favorite cast? Lisa Kudrow, Anthony Hopkins, Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman, and my wife. ~ William H. Macy

Dysfunctional families have sired a number of pretty good actors. ~ Gene Hackman

I wrote three mysteries and then a contemporary spy novel that was unbelievably derivative - completely based on 'The Conversation,' the movie with Gene Hackman. Amazingly, the character in the book looks exactly like ... Gene Hackman. ~ Alan Furst

It was just the thrill of a lifetime. Brando and Hackman were two of my heroes. ~ Richard Donner

I write in the morning from about eight till noon, and sometimes again a bit in the afternoon. In the morning I start off by going over what I had done the previous day, which my wife has happily typed up for me. ~ Gene Hackman

I have trouble with direction, because I have trouble with authority. I was not a good Marine. ~ Gene Hackman

My grandfather had been a newspaper reporter, as was my uncle. They were pretty good writers and so I thought maybe somewhere down the line I would do some writing. ~ Gene Hackman

I lost touch with my son in terms of advice early on. Maybe it had to do with being gone so much, doing location films when he was at an age where he needed support and guidance. ~ Gene Hackman

When overpowering authority or leadership intervenes in a team, it can affect the team by (1) throwing the team off track, (2) decreasing the motivation of the team, (3) reducing the commitment of the team members, and (4) causing more problems than solutions. ~ J. Richard Hackman

I'm not an Adonis, that's for damn sure. I've never really thought of myself that way, and it doesn't matter to me. My favorite actors aren't Adonises. Dustin Hoffman is a flawed-looking man; he's amazing to me. Tom Hanks is flawed-looking; people love him. Same with Gene Hackman. ~ Shia Labeouf

Gene Hackman was a superstar in the '70s - with that face! ~ Joel Edgerton

Five players on the floor functioning as a single unit: team, team, team-no one more important than the other. ~ Gene Hackman

I went to L.A. to be Brad Pitt; now I just want to be Gene Hackman. I came to Nashville to be Kenny Chesney. I'd be very fortunate to be George Strait. ~ Christian Kane

It really costs me a lot emotionally to watch myself on screen. I think of myself, and feel like I'm quite young, and then I look at this old man with the baggy chins and the tired eyes and the receding hairline and all that. ~ Gene Hackman

That's the great thing about plankton. It pretty much keeps to itself. ~ Gene Hackman

If you are in an improv jazz ensemble or a small chamber group, you learn to think fast on your feet and how to be flexible and to collaborate and compromise, and that may yield a creative outcome. ~ J. Richard Hackman

The fact that they let me in a movie with Gene Hackman has left me with no faith in show buisness. ~ Ray Romano

I still assume that, any day, I'm going to be exposed as a fraud. That, like I once heard Gene Hackman say, the acting police are going to burst in and take away my card. ~ Chris Pine

I went in the Marines when I was 16. I spent four and a half years in the Marines and then came right to New York to be an actor. And then seven years later, I got my first job. ~ Gene Hackman

My wife and I take what we call our Friday comedy day off. We watch standup comics on TV. The raunchier the better. We love Eddie Izzard. ~ Gene Hackman

Seventy-five per cent of being successful as an actor is pure luck. The rest is just endurance. ~ Gene Hackman

My early days in Broadway were all comedies. I never did a straight play on Broadway. ~ Gene Hackman

I left home when I was 16 because I was looking for adventure. ~ Gene Hackman

Once, I optioned a novel and tried to do a screenplay on it, which was great fun, but I was too respectful. I was only 100 pages into the novel and I had about 90 pages of movie script going. I realized I had a lot to learn. ~ Gene Hackman

If you look at yourself as a star, you've already lost something in the portrayal of any human being. ~ Gene Hackman

The worst job I ever had was working nights in the Chrysler Building. I was part of a team of about five guys, and we polished the leather furniture. ~ Gene Hackman